


Bruises (Part 1)

by GameraJr



Series: Bruises [1]
Category: Farscape
Genre: Farscape - Freeform, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-16
Updated: 2018-11-16
Packaged: 2019-08-24 16:21:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,428
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16643600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GameraJr/pseuds/GameraJr
Summary: Premise:  John Crichton hires a professional fighter to teach him combat skills after being separated from Moya after the Season 3 finale, only to discover that his teacher is a man who is supposed to be dead.Setting:  This story takes place approximately one solar month (monen) after John is separated from Moya and the crew in “Dog With Two Bones”.   Post Season 3.   In this AU of the beginning of Season 4, John is left adrift in space after Aeryn leaves and Moya is sucked down a wormhole.  He crash-lands on a nearby planet instead of being saved by another leviathan.Disclaimer:  Farscape isn’t mine, never was mine and never will be.  Nor are its characters.  They belong to Brian Henson.  This is a not-for-profit hack attempt at writing a Farscape related story.





	Bruises (Part 1)

PLANET TAVIS V, IN THE UNCHARTED TERRITORIES….

The crowd whooped and hollered with bloodlust as the brawny combatant’s huge fist came down squarely on the forehead of the green three-eyed alien laying sprawled on the hot dust beneath him. Dark, black blood squirted out the creature’s ears from the concussion of the enormous impact, and his head snapped back, slamming the ground underneath him. His three eyes swirled in opposite directions and lids shuttered closed, then his head fell loosely to one side.

Lights out. 

The big Sebacean rose up and remained standing over the lifeless body, his ragged and torn knuckles still balled into hammer-like fists at his side. His chest heaved from the exertion, and a slow, crooked smile slowly widened across his scarred, pugnacious face as he gazed down at his unconscious opponent. 

A crackling, high pitched voice broke out through speakers over the screaming crowds. “We have a winner! Vrod, the uncontested champion of the Tavis System, is victorious again! A knock out, in two in one-half rounds! All hail the uncontested champion. Vrod.... Vrod!” The crowd stomped and chanted the name over and over, and as two medics trotted out with a litter to pick up the unconscious opponent, Vrod waved to the crowd and made his way back to the grandstand. 

Ignoring the blood dripping off his mangled hands, Vrod grabbed his duffle bag off a bench and walked over to the judge’s booth at the edge of the arena. He haggled with a short, squat, enormously fat Hynerian for several moments before snarling and grabbing a bag of kryndars from the creature’s stubby three-fingered hand. The thieving little bastard had welched on paying him the full purse, claiming that the knockout had come too quickly and that the crowd had not gotten their money’s worth. 

Vrod shouldered his bag and stormed out of the pavilion, furrowing a path through the crowd who had congregated at the exit to try to get a closer look at him. As he passed through the arched doorway under the stands, a hooded figure, lurking in the blackness of the shadows, broke from it’s dark corner and followed him out onto the moonlit street. The shadow stealthily tracked Vrod as he snaked his way down dusty, narrow streets and dank alleyways for many blocks, until they emerged out onto a dark, deserted cul-de-sac, whose only illumination came from the windows of what looked to be an old run-down tavern at the end. A few drunken denizens congregated near the entrance. The whole place stank of human filth and stale alcohol. 

Vrod had been aware of his follower for quite some time. It was not the first time he had been tailed, but usually anyone who wanted to harm him would have attacked by now. His patience at an end, Vrod stopped dead in his tracks in the middle of the street. “I hear you behind me…whoever you are. Make your decision now. Step out into the light and face me…or be on your way.” Vrod turned around and planted his feet, ready for whatever this foolish interloper had planned.

“I just want to talk” the figure replied from the shadows. I’m not armed.” The man slowly stepped closer and carefully opened his overcoat wide to show his lack of weaponry.

“I said…step into the light where I can get a good look at you!” Vrod ordered. 

Keeping his coat held open, the figure slowly stepped forward until he was mostly illuminated by the street light. He was dressed in a black, full-length leather longcoat with a hood pulled down, concealing most of his face. The man’s black leather trousers and heavy-heeled combat boots put Vrod on instant alert. The big man’s instantly reached behind him for the dagger nestled in his waistband. He backed up a bit and readied to draw. “Peacekeeper huh? What do you want from me? Any sudden moves and you’re a dead man. Now state your business!” Vrod growled. 

“I’m not a Peacekeeper. I just borrowed some clothes from them. Look, I just want to talk to you. Out here…inside the tavern…wherever you want. I have a business proposition for you. I just want a few macrots of your time is all,” the man answered in a gravelly voice with a strange accent Vrod could not place. 

“Well you have some stones walking around this spaceport dressed like a Peacekeeper my friend. You’re lucky you haven’t been jumped yet,” Vrod replied sarcastically. 

“I already was,” the man replied quietly with what sounded like embarrassment. “…today as a matter of fact, not long before the tournament.” 

Vrod eased off his knife and stepped closer to the stranger. “You speak with a language I haven’t heard before. My translator microbes are only translating about two-thirds of what you’re saying. So what happened? Speak simply.” 

“I was attacked… in an alley… by some thieves. Luckily, I only had some spending money on me. As you can see, that made them mad, and they kicked the hezmana out of me. …” With that the stranger flipped back his hood to reveal a sunburnt, Sebacean-looking face with brown hair and bright, ice-blue eyes. He was an otherwise handsome man, but the good looks were marred by an ugly red bruise on his forehead, a split left brow, and swollen lower lip. 

As Vrod surveyed the damage, the stranger pulled out a small bag and held it out to him. Eying the stranger suspiciously, he grabbed and opened the bag to reveal a nice, tidy pile of gleaming kryndars…about twenty or so.

“I want you to teach me how …how to fight... how to protect myself,” the stranger said hesitantly. 

Vrod looked back up at him with a bemused look. “Teach YOU? How to fight?” Vrod asked with unbelief mixed with disdain. “You’re dressed like a Peacekeeper and you can’t fight? How come you do not know combat skills? Why in Cholok’s name would you be out here in the UTs without even the basic skills to survive?” 

“Like I said… I’m not a Peacekeeper,” the stranger replied quietly, “...even though I may be dressed like one. I’m not even a soldier. Look… it’s a long story, but suffice it to say I did not end up on this planet willingly. I was separated from my ship and crew. I crash landed here. I’m… stuck here, you see.” The stranger paused for a moment. A cloud had settled over his face, as if that statement caused him deep distress. After a moment, he looked back at Vrod and continued. “I have the money to pay you. You have the skills I am after, and I need to learn to survive out here in the Uncharted Territories. My dad always taught me, if you want to learn how to do something, learn from the best. Well, from what I have seen, you are the best here on Tavis.”

Vrod chuckled at the audacity of the man. “Heh heh heh…well you have that right stranger,” Vrod replied with a gnarly grin. “I am the best hand-to-hand fighter on this planet, and across this whole system for that matter. But you are rather puny for a Sebacean. I am not sure you would be able to withstand the punishment. If I were to even consider training you, which I have not yet, do you really think you would survive it?” 

The man smiled ruefully. “Over the last three cycles I’ve survived more beatings and tortures than I ever thought I would, and I’m still here," he replied. "I’m not exactly in one piece, but I survived, and I learn fast. And I'm not completely helpless. One of my shipmates, an ex-Peacekeeper taught me some combat training. I know enough to get myself into trouble, but that's about it. Look, If you take my offer, I promise you that you will have the most diligent student you could ask for. I am offering you these twenty kryndars up front, and then I will pay you three kryndars a session until I have learned enough to take care of myself.” 

“Well…what makes you think I won’t just kill you here and now and take all your kryndars?” Vrod asked the stranger with a malicious sneer. “It would be far easier than wasting my time for the next few monens teaching a hopeless transient how to fight.” 

The stranger looked evenly at him and after a few moments a slight grin broke the gloominess of his countenance. “Well, I don’t know. You have a point… you could kill me easily if you wanted to. But…well…despite your fierceness, you come across as an honorable man. I’ve watched you fight over the last several days, and you are probably the only combatant who hasn’t killed anyone during this tournament. You have knocked every opponent unconscious when you could have done otherwise… even when it would have been just as easy to kill them and collect a bigger purse. But you didn’t. You always held back. To me that shows mercy, and usually it’s the honorable ones who show mercy when everyone around them is pushing for a kill.” 

Vrod stared at the man with a look of puzzlement. No one had ever called him “honorable”. They had called him lots of things, but never that. Despite himself, Vrod found himself impressed with the stranger, regardless of the man’s obvious physical shortcomings. He sized him up from head to toe slowly, assessing what it would take to whip this untrained amateur into some semblance of a fighter. After several moments of inspection Vrod smiled and folded up the coin bag and stuffed it inside the folds of his tunic. 

“Alright off-worlder, I will teach you to fight,” Vrod said in a low quiet voice. “I have serious doubts that you will succeed in becoming proficient, but it would not be the first time I was wrong. What is your name?” 

The stranger looked up at him, his eyes flickering like blue flame with a mixture of both caution and resignation. “Crichton…. John Crichton. But I would ask you keep my name to yourself. You see, I’m wanted by the Peacekeepers.” Those last words hung in the silence between the two men for some time. 

Vrod’s eyes widened in recognition. “I’ve heard the name. I've seen the wanted beacons. You blew up a Gammak base, as well as a Peacekeeper command carrier, did you not?” 

Crichton tensed for a moment, wondering if the big man was going to grab him by the throat, stuff him in a sack, and turn him in for the bounty money. But he knew that any dishonesty now would surely end in the same result down the road anyways. Crichton never could hide his lies. Better to be up front with Vrod if he wanted to earn his trust.

“Yes…,” John replied hesitantly. “It is true what you heard. And I’ve done a lot of other questionable things that have made me a very wanted man. These are the reasons I need to learn how to fight and take care of myself. My crewmates were expert fighters, better than I will ever hope to be, and they basically protected me and looked after me. But they are not there for me to fall back on anymore. I have to learn to fight well enough to take care of myself. There are many things I need to do…things I need to set right, and... well, I have no one to help me anymore.”

“Well…” Vrod looked at Crichton dubiously. “I have no love for Peacekeepers. I will train you John Crichton. Three arns a day, every other day for the next ten weekens. In between days you will be on a training regimen…MY training regimen. And I assure you, by next weeken you will be wishing you had never met me!” And with that Vrod laughed heartily, and clapped his huge paw down onto Crichton’s shoulder, eliciting a wince of pain from the human. “Come! Let us go inside the tavern and get something to eat. You are buying Crichton!” And with that Vrod spun around and marched towards the tavern door. 

Crichton sighed and smiled to himself. “Well Grasshopper, you found your Master Po.” 

******************  
Three monens later…

Crichton sat on the wooden floor of his tiny room, his back against the disheveled bed, studying his bandaged hands. For three Earth months now he had survived Vrod’s combat instruction, and his hands had taken the worst of the punishment. Lumps of scar tissue had already formed at the crowns of his knuckles. Traces of suture lines criss-crossed the backs of his hands where the Diagnosian had stitched the cuts and wounds he had received fending off and parrying vicious blows. 

He took to measuring his progress towards competency by the diminishing number of visits to the Diagnosian that he was having to make each week. The first monen of training was the worst, where he had, quite literally, dragged himself or had to be carried to the healer two to three times a week after suffering through brutal “training sessions”. He lost count of the mended bones and sutured cuts he endured, but he had the money to pay the healer, and this particular doctor was a very good one. How such a competent medic ended up on this backwater planet Crichton could only surmise. He suspected the Diagnosian had gotten herself into some kind of trouble off-world and was in hiding. It was the only explanation he could come up with. She certainly didn’t come here for the balmy weather and friendly hospitality. 

His entire body ached, not so much from injuries anymore, as from the grueling training regimen Vrod required him to endure. Each week Vrod introduced new exercises, and each week he stepped up the intensity of the sessions. Every morning John would lurch out of bed before dawn and run for two hours. He had no way of measuring his daily excursions, but he estimated he was running five to six miles every morning. Then after arriving at Vrod’s compound, he would perform the Kal-tara exercises that Vrod had taught him. Kal-tara was not unlike the calisthenics he had done in football practice as a teenager, but they were far more grueling and intense, focusing on stretching and elongating the long muscle groups and promoting extreme joint flexibility. There were times when John feared his arms and legs were going to rip out of their sockets as he performed the bizarre maneuvers. He did several types of sit-up exercises similar to those on Earth, but more of them, at far more repetitions. This was particularly painful, as John had not paid much attention to his abdominal muscles over the last few cycles, but each day got better as he became stronger.

After an hour or so of Kal-tara came weight training. This was something John knew well and had experience with, and he was pleasantly surprised to find that the equipment and exercises Vrod used for body building were very similar if not identical to those on earth. There were the Tavis V versions of barbells, dumbbells, benches, universal machine-type contraptions, curl bars…all virtually the same as what John used for his IASA training back home. However, the weights he used now were far heavier that he was used to, and most of the time he squirmed and struggled to hoist them, as Vrod and his assistants watched with amusement and taunting. After two hours of this humiliating torment Vrod would allow John a brief lunch break to re-fuel, and then it was back two more hours of Kal-tara, and then an hour of aerobic exercises.

By each fternoon, John was completely spent and exhausted, but it didn’t end there. At around mid-afternoon John would stagger to a nearby bath house where odd looking, pig-like creatures the locals called B’Reths would lay him down naked on a warm stone slab and massage his sore muscles with burly hands that looked like four-digit camel feet. This was his favorite part of the day. The B’Reth were good at their trade, and by the time John had been massaged, bathed and soaked in hot baths, he felt like he could ooze out into the street as a dismembered and liquefied blob of bone, jelly and flesh. He would hail one of the planet’s versions of a hover-rickshaw, crawl inside, and drive back to the little squalid apartment he called home where he would be asleep before his head hit the blood-stained pillow. 

This was the pattern his life was now following. Three days of working out interspersed with three days of combat training and one day of rest. On his off-day, John would sleep in, then visit the storage yard where he kept his module. The craft had suffered mightily in the crash landing and John was spending all day, every off-day, modifying parts and making repairs. He would also take the time to replenish his weekly supply of krindars: his leftover share from the theft and destruction of the Shadow Depository, which were hoarded away in a secret space behind the pilot seat. Then it was back home late at night in order rise early to begin the next six days of training. It got to a point where John simply fell in to the flow, not keeping track of the days or hours. Weekens blended into monens…it all became a blur. He was on auto-pilot. 

It was only at night that his mind felt free to wander, and it usually wandered in one of two directions: wormholes or towards a certain raven-haired Peacekeeper warrior woman who had left him behind monens ago. Thoughts of wormholes he could shut on and off, but Aeryn? He had no control over when the memory of her would sneak up and assault him from out of nowhere. Even in his sleep he could not escape her. She was always there, a dark wing hovering on the fringes of his dreams, and her arrival into his thoughts always brought with it searing pain and loneliness.

He often asked himself why he was doing this. Why was he daily submitting himself to Vrod’s torment when he could be looking for a way off this cold, barren rock? The answer was simple: he had enough money to repair the Farscape module, but even if repaired, the little craft simply did not have the range to get him to the next planet over, much less search the vastness of space for Moya. And so here he was on Tavis V, stuck, and with no particular place to go. It was a pathetically boring and desolate planet. He had no skills that would land him gainful employment, and so he was left to spend what time he had trying to make the best of his situation. If he rationed his money correctly, and lived a spartan existence, he had enough krindars to pay Vrod and keep a roof over his head for at another cycle at most. Given that he was now completely alone and at the mercy of his lack of employability, he figured the logical course of action was to learn how to protect himself and evade the attacks that he knew were coming at any time in the future. Since the destruction of Scorpius’s carrier, the Peacekeepers’ efforts to track him down had quadrupled. It was only a matter of time before a bounty hunter or tracker spotted him. He could not be caught again…he would not.

To this end he packed away his black Peacekeeper leathers and took on the look of one of the millions of Sebaceans in this vast city. He switched to brown leather trousers and boots, a black shirt, and over all a warm, loose-fitting, knee-length tunic made of a course material that felt like wooly burlap. The only Peacekeeper remnants he wore were his beloved pulse pistol "Winona" and, sometimes in colder weather, his black overcoat. He had also taken to growing out his beard, and allowed his hair to grow long over his shoulders to help conceal his identity. During his wanderings through the city, he came upon wanted beacons for his arrest. whenever he came upon one he would disable it. But it seemed for every beacon he destroyed, there were three more waiting to be found. 

As austere as his life had become, the daily routine of training kept him busy and kept his mind active. His new mission to learn combat skills had, in great part, kept his mind busy and off of Aeryn. As Vrod was teaching John new techniques each day, the mass of new information crowded his mind and preoccupied his thoughts. It wasn’t enough for Vrod to show John the various techniques, but he made sure that John knew the history, origin and development of each fighting discipline. Most of the time John found the information to be uninteresting and extraneous, but, as the weekens passed, the human’s admiration and respect for Vrod’s knowledge and experience grew. He began to realize that the man was much more than a brutish, callous pit fighter. On the contrary, John found Vrod to be a passionate and thoughtful student and devotee of the martial arts he practiced. He had become a master, scholar and historian of dozens of fighting disciplines gleaned from every corner of the galaxy. “No wonder this guy is so good!” John often thought as he watched his teacher spar with assistants. There was almost no fighting technique Vrod had not studied and become at the very least proficient at, and most he had mastered.

John also noted that the particular fighting style he was being taught was a combination of many different fighting and grappling techniques. Many of the forms were right out of the Peacekeeper Pan’tak instructional manual, and were those he had seen Aeryn use (and use on him!) many times. Some he recognized as Luxan in origin, and some as Delvian, but then there were many other bizarre fighting techniques that had no name and that he did not recognize, whose origins were ancient and forgotten. Vrod had taken the most efficient and effective forms and techniques from each discipline and combined them into a personalized system of fighting that allowed the combatant to defend against almost any style of combat and then retaliate in a way that would take the opponent by surprise. It was this amalgamated mash of styles that Vrod had John focus on, and in doing so it allowed the inexperienced human to quickly master only the most effective moves from each discipline, while discarding those which were extraneous and a waste of time. Some of the techniques reminded John of Earth-based Kung Fu or Karate, but others bore no resemblance to any fighting style John had ever seen on any Saturday afternoon Shaw Brothers’ film back home. 

John chuckled at this as he sat there staring at his mangled fists. He never dreamed he would ever be studying martial arts. Yes, he had always been a proficient athlete, and he did well in sports in high school, but he never had any ambition or desire to learn to fight. Combat was simply not part of his structure -- not in his DNA. Growing up, he was always able to talk his way out of fights, relying on his eccentric sense of humor and gift of gab to charm his way out of tight situations. But that didn’t work so well out here in the UTs. He admitted to himself that he was lucky to have lived as long as he had, and most of the credit for his survival went to his crewmates back on Moya…the ones who weren’t there anymore.

And with this thought came a wave of regret that coursed through him as he admitted the truth to himself: for the last three cycles John had been a burden to his friends. He was nothing more than a piece of baggage they were forced to haul around with them, take care and keep track of. No wonder they were anxious to split up and go their separate ways after the destruction of Scorpius’s command carrier. He would have been too if he had been forced to play nanny to a bungling, helpless, deficient human. That thought just added more to the emptiness he felt. He was truly lonely for the first time since he had come through the wormhole three and a half cycles ago. 

Pushing himself up off the floor and standing with a groan he sat on the bed and untied his boots and kicked them off. Shrugging off his pants he fell back on to the grimy pillow. As he reached under it he felt the little bundle and pulled it out. He lay there and stared at the bunch of strands of jet black hair tied with a cord in his hand: the hair he had cut from Aeryn as she lay in her casket on the Diagnosian planet... after he had killed her while under the influence of the mind-clone Harvey. He had kept her hair as his talisman, even after she was brought back from death by Zhann. He smelled it and could still detect a hint of the perfume that Zhann had given Aeryn to scent it, and he realized that right there in his hand lay a tangible reminder of two women he had loved and lost. One had been a dear friend who had given her life to save another, and the other one he had almost…almost… 

He pushed the bundle back under his pillow and gave himself over to silent tears, and then slipped into troubled sleep.

******************

Six monens later…

Vrod was sitting cross-legged on the floor on a cushioned mat, gazing down into the practice pit where Chricton was sparring with a Sebacean assistant trainer named K’Tell. The “hoo-man” had come far over the last nine monens that he had been here, and Vrod was pleased that his efforts were finally bearing fruit. He had never trained anyone from beginner-level before, and he found the effort surprisingly satisfying and even, daresay, fulfilling. 

“Keep your left up hoo-man! Don’t drop your guard when you do the Sheersahau kick! How many times do I have to hammer that into your head?!” Vrod screamed at Crichton when he saw the man drop his guard while doing a well-aimed left roundhouse kick to the assistant’s head. Actually, it was the first time in a long while since he had had to chastise Crichton for a bad move. The Erp-man had progressed by leaps and bounds over the relatively short time he had been there… much to Vrod’s personal satisfaction.

It got Vrod to thinking about his future, something he was doing a lot of lately. He was eighty-four cycles old, approaching middle-age, and yet already he could feel himself slowing down. The multitude of injuries he had absorbed over the past thirty cycles of fighting professionally were finally taking their toll, and although he was set pretty well financially, he knew his mind would wither away from boredom as soon as he retired from the pit. He would need a new vocation to occupy his mind and time, and now the arrival of this strange alien was proof positive to him that Cholak was steering him towards becoming a full-time trainer, and maybe even opening up his own school for combat training. If he could teach a clueless specimen like Crichton to fight well, he could teach anyone.  
“If Crichton is representative of his race,” Vrod thought, “may Cholak save them.” Upon first impression there had been nothing physically impressive about Crichton at all. Although healthy and well-muscled, he was no stronger than the average Sebacean, nowhere half as strong as the average Peacekeeper, and perhaps only a third as strong as a Grudek or Delvian. Against untrained Sebaceans, Zanetans or Nebari he could probably have held his own in a fair altercation, but not without effort. Now, with the skills and techniques Vrod had drilled into his student over the torturous past months, along with the impressive increase in the man’s body mass and physical strength, he was confident that Crichton could hold his own even against larger more powerful opponents…perhaps even a Luxan if he tried hard enough. 

Two things about Crichton did impress him from the first, however. One of them was the man’s intelligence: Crichton was surprisingly smart… smarter by half than most species he had encountered, and eager to learn and very attentive. Vrod rarely had to tell Crichton anything twice. When he got something he got it, and rarely forgot it. Crichton also possessed good common sense and a surprisingly tactical mind, which Vrod surmised must have been the reason he had survived for as long as he had in the UTs. Winning fights was as much a mental game as a physical one, sometimes more so. Vrod was the warrior he was because he could out-think and outsmart his opponents, and he saw this same trait in Crichton. Having now mastered a great many moves and techniques, Crichton was lately starting to combine different maneuvers in ways even Vrod would never have thought of. 

The second quality about Crichton that Vrod had grown to admire was the human’s determination. He simply refused to give up, even when beaten to a pulp, badly injured and barely able to stand, Crichton would not call quits. On several occasions Vrod allowed his assistants to wail on Crichton to a point where most creatures would have begged for mercy. Not Crichton: he was infuriatingly stubborn, and oftentimes was able to outlast his sparring partners until they were utterly exhausted, before he lashed out with one final burst of energy, winning a match through sheer willpower and tenacity. If Vrod and his assistants had ridiculed Crichton at the beginning, they were not laughing now. The human had won their respect and grudging admiration, if for nothing more than his indomitability. 

Vrod pondered these things as he watched Crichton and the assistant trainer spar. After some back and forth kicks and parries K’Tell suddenly stepped back and delivered a blindingly fast, straight right Delvian thruma kick to Crichton’s head. Somehow Crichton dodged to his right at the last split second and countered with a left leg sweep to the assistant’s supporting leg, knocking him backwards. Before he could regain his feet Crichton closed the distance and came down on the assistant’s thigh with a perfectly placed Scorvian skreet-kcha kick. K’Tell howled with pain, rolled away and attempted to regain his feet, but as his leg was now paralyzed he could do nothing but try to kick at Crichton with his good leg. Crichton stayed on him, managing to catch the assistant’s kicking leg in the crook of his elbow, and dropping to one knee while twisting down he forced K’Tell to turn over to keep from snapping the knee. Crichton then pushed forward with all his weight pinning the Sebacean face down on the floor. Once he had him flat on his belly, and with his foot and knee still locked between his elbow and right thigh, Crichton delivered a sharp side-hand strike to the back of K’Tell’s head, slamming his nose into the floor and knocking him unconscious. 

Vrod smacked his fist against the mat with satisfaction. “Good Crichton! Excellent! Choro, Var! Pick K’Tell up and get him to the Diagnosian. I want him back to work tomorrow!” As two other assistants entered the pit and hauled the unconscious K’Tell out, Vrod waved to Crichton to come up onto the dais and join him. John grabbed a towel from the rack and slowly walked up the ramp. He was winded, but he reminded himself that nine months ago he would have been unconscious and bleeding. Wiping the sweat off his face and neck, he squatted down and sat near Vrod, wondering what the trainer wanted to discuss with him. He and Vrod had engaged in very few “heart to heart” conversations over the last nine monens, and those conversations were usually nothing more than Vrod rattling off an endless list of things Crichton was doing wrong. 

“That was an excellent knockout you made Crichton,” Vrod began. “You did it exactly the way I would have.” Vrod smiled and leaned back, and looked at Crichton through squinting eyes. “You have come far Crichton, in a very short span of time. But I think you have come to a point where you need to make a decision about where you want to go from here.” 

John frowned, not understanding. “What do you mean?”

Vrod reached down and took a swig of raslak from a small earthenware jug sitting next to him. “What I mean is Crichton… you have come to the point where you have to decide if I have taught you enough to where you feel confident you can hold your own in a fight, or if you want to continue on becoming more proficient. You have learned and mastered more moves from more different species in the last nine monens than most fighters master in five cycles. You have exceeded my expectations Crichton, and as much as I would love to continue taking your money, you have probably learned all you need to know to be able to take on and defeat most of those enemies who wish to do you harm.” 

John was incredulous, and it took several moments for him to absorb what his teacher was telling him. “So, you really think I have learned enough to take care of myself?” 

Vrod laughed. “Ha ha ha ha ha…and then some!” Vrod exclaimed, reaching over and smacking Crichton on the shoulder. “Look Crichton…as long as you continue to work out, keep in shape, and practice your moves and forms every day as I have taught you, you will do well. The truth is, I have a major tournament on a nearby planet called Tasleen that I will be competing in three weekens from now, and I have to begin concentrating on getting ready for that. I honestly have no more time to spare to teach you Crichton.” 

“Oh…I see…” Crichton said in a deflated tone. “Let me ask you Vrod. Could I beat a Peacekeeper?”

Vrod smiled a wicked smile. “You just did.”

“What? What do you mean,” Crichton asked suspiciously. 

Vrod looked across the way and nodded to where the assistants were leading K’Tell out the front entrance to help him down the street to the medic’s clinic. “K’Tell used to be a Peacekeeper Crichton…and so was I once.” 

Crichton jumped up, his flight instinct kicking in. He felt the hair on the back of his neck rise. “What? What the hell are you talking about? I thought you said you hated Peacekeepers. Now you’re telling me you are one?” He began to back away but Vrod raised a hand to calm him. 

“Easy Crichton. Calm yourself,” Vrod said sternly. “No one is after you and no one is going to turn you in. If I wanted the bounty on your head I would have turned you over nine monens ago. Now sit down and calm down.” 

“Calm down?” Crichton replied with an indignant laugh. “You’ve been lying to me Vrod! I thought you were all about honor…and you keep me in the dark?” John had a hurt look on his face and stood there wound like a spring. 

“Crichton I did not lie to you. I just did not reveal my past. I am no longer a Peacekeeper. I have not been one for over thirty cycles. I was a Lieutenant on a command carrier once, long ago, but I committed a serious crime, and so they court-martialed me and stripped me of all rank.”

“What was your crime?” Crichton asked.

“It doesn’t matter. It was long ago,” Vrod replied shaking his head.

“It matters to me Vrod. Everyone I have met in this craphole end of the galaxy has been jerking my chain since I got here, and I didn’t expect to be getting sandbagged by my own teacher…a man I have grown to admire and trust.” 

Vrod sighed and grinned slightly. “Very well hoo-man.” His eyes fell to the floor again. “I fell in love with a woman…a fellow Peacekeeper,” he continued, with a deep sadness in his eyes.  
John stared at Vrod for a long moment and then sat back down. After a long silence he decided that since Vrod had opened up to him, he should let a crack in his armor open also. They might as well lay all their cards down. 

“Yeah…I know how that goes. I fell in love with a Peacekeeper female myself. That is partly why I am here today. It didn’t work out too good for me either.”

Vrod smiled knowingly and handed Crichton the raslak bottle. “Yes…women have that effect. They are the headiest drug in the known universe. Once addicted, there is no cure.” Vrod sat for a long while, a smile on his lips and a far off gaze in his eyes as he reminisced over some cherished, hidden memory.

John took a swig and decided to press for more now that he had calmed down, and now that Vrod seemed in the mood to talk. They had never just sat and had a talk like this, man to man, and Crichton knew he might never get another chance. “Vrod what happened, if I may ask? What did you and this woman do that was so heinous as to get you kicked out of the Space Nazis?”  
Vrod took the raslak that Crichton handed back to him. 

“As you may know Crichton,’ he began, “…personal relationships are forbidden among the Peacekeepers. Ours was a love that snuck up upon both of us unawares. It clouded our good sense. She was a pilot…a brilliant one, the best I ever saw…and she was beautiful of course. But she also had a fire in her Crichton: a spirit that would not be suppressed by Peacekeeper dogma. It was impossible not to be smitten with her. She saw something in me also. What it was I will never know. I was a weapons and combat training officer at the time. I was nothing special. I was just a line officer with some fighting talent, going about his business. And yet she chose me for some reason, and we soon began looking for every opportunity to be together. Amidst the foolishness of our passion, we chose to conceive a child, without consent of our superiors. My mate gave birth to a girl, and for four cycles we were able to keep our deception a secret. Then….” Here Vrod stopped. His eyes fell to the floor and his face darkened. 

“Then what?” John probed, leaning in. As Vrod had been recounting his tale, John had felt the hackles start to rise on the back of his neck again. The slow insidious tingle of realization was creeping up his spine. He had heard this same story before! 

Vrod looked back up at Crichton and shook his head and sighed. “Some things are not good to remember Crichton. Some pains… are best left in the past.” Vrod suddenly rose up and shook the stiffness out of his legs. “It was a good session today John. You did well,” he continued, “…but as I said earlier, you need to make a decision about where you go from here. Go get a bath and go home and think on it. We’ll talk more in the morning.” 

Vrod turned around to leave, but Crichton could not keep silent. He jumped to his feet and called after him. “Xhalax! Her name was Xhalax…. Xhalax Sun.” 

The ex-Peacekeeper stopped dead in his tracks and spun around with a look of wide-eyed mortification. He slowly stalked back towards Crichton, his countenance now becoming menacing.  
“What do you know… about Xhalax Sun… hoo-man?” Vrod looked like a panther ready to pounce.

Crichton suddenly regretted his outburst. He was going to have to be very careful here. Suspicion can run both ways, and now it seemed Vrod was wondering if his student was actually some sort of spy. Crichton raised up his hands in acquiescence. “Vrod… I know this story. It was told to me by another Peacekeeper. The one I fell in love with. The one who left me. Her name was Aeryn… Aeryn Sun.” 

Vrod seemed frozen in place, his eyes fixed on some distant point. He had stopped breathing, and Crichton could see the gears of memory spinning and churning behind those dark Sebacean eyes. It seemed like an arn before Vrod finally exhaled and whispered the name. “Aeryn… Aeryn…” Then it came: a wave of sadness and regret cascaded down the big man’s face. His shoulders slumped, and to Crichton it seemed that the steely façade of strength and vigor he showed the world had buckled and imploded inward, and was then yanked away like a flimsy curtain, revealing the face of a tired, lonely, sad old man. In the space of just a few microts, Vrod had aged twenty cycles. 

A tear slid down one side of his face, and Vrod turned away, refusing to let Crichton see more of his weakness. He walked over to a nearby bench and slumped down again, still facing away from his pupil.

“Aeryn is your daughter isn’t she Vrod?” John asked gently as he approached the trainer. “Or…should I call you…Talyn?” The name hung there like a storm cloud, sucking all the sound from the surrounding air. 

Crichton got his affirmation after waiting several microts and no reply from his teacher. “God…I can’t believe this,” John said with exasperation. He wiped his eyes with both hands and slid them up over his head and pulled his hair back. “This can’t be happening. This cannot be happening! I am so tired of this fate crap! Why can’t the universe just leave me alone?” Crichton just stood there, defeated, fidgeting and swaying and not knowing what to do or say or where to go. 

A soft laugh broke his reverie and he looked over at Vrod.

“Heh heh heh….Talyn.” Vrod chuckled. “Talyn.” He stood up slowly and faced Crichton again. His features had softened somewhat. “Now… that is a name I have not heard in a long, long time.” 

For second John stared back at him, and then a smile slowly spread over his own face and he laughed his goofy Crichton laugh. 

“What is it you foolish hoo-man? What is so funny?” Talyn asked bemused.

John got hold of himself. “Oh, it’s nothing. For a moment there you reminded me of Obi Wan Kenobi. He said that exact same thing to Luke Skywalker.” 

“Are these two men acquaintances of yours Crichton?” 

Crichton chuckled again and shook his head. “No. No not really. But they were two men like you and me. Teacher and student, trying to figure each other out. It would seem that you and I have much to discuss. Why don’t we take a walk down to the tavern and I’ll buy you a drink Vrod…or Talyn…or whatever you want me to call you…”

The teacher grinned. “Call me Vrod please Crichton. I have not been Talyn Lyczac for over thirty cycles. That man is dead. He was killed.” 

Crichton nodded and looked down. “Yeah I know. I think I know how it went down. Aeryn didn’t tell me, but another ex-Peacekeeper I know did. What I want to know… is how you survived.”

A silence fell for a moment as the two men considered one another, then Vrod clapped Crichton on the shoulder. “That…Crichton…is an epic tale. Yes, I will drink with you. And perhaps, at some point, you can tell me about my daughter.” 

************************* 

At a tavern, later that night…

The tavern was dark and full of smoke, and smelled like a proper tavern should. There were few patrons this night. Most of them circled around a table in the corner where some kind of gambling game was underway, and across the room in an opposite corner, in a booth illuminated by a single overhead lamp, sat Chricton and Vrod. 

As the two men sipped at their drinks, Crichton was finally wrapping up his story. It had been a long one, encompassing the moment he broke the rough the wormhole, to his capture by Crais and meeting the radiant Officer Aeryn Sun for the first time, to his various adventures evading the Peacekeepers and Scorpius, of wormholes and Ancients, of blowing up a Gammak base, destroying a Shadow Depository, and the destruction of Scorpius’s command carrier. He had to repeat a few parts of the tale, especially the part about him being twinned, and about how the other “him” had left Moya with Aeryn, only to later die in her arms, and how she came back intent on ignoring him and fleeing from her pain. He finished with the tale of how he learned of Aeryn’s pregnancy, how he had chased her and ended up being stranded when Moya was sucked down a wormhole, and how he barely had enough oxygen and fuel left to make it to Tavis V before having to crash land. 

To his credit Vrod had been a patient and apt listener, and seemed completely engrossed by what he had heard, only interrupting occasionally and allowing Crichton to talk freely…something the human needed no training in. At the end of it he sat back and considered all he had heard. 

“That is quite some tale. It seems you have lived the life of ten men over the last four cycles. I have to hand it to you…you are resilient Crichton. But you glossed over one detail: what happened to Xhalax Sun?”

Crichton swallowed a deep draught of raslak and took a long moment to consider how he was going to break the news to his teacher. He looked the trainer in the eye and asked “Do you really want to know that Vrod? Do you really?”

Vrod studied Crichton hard for several moments, is if he could bore his eyes through him. Then he nodded his head in understanding. “She’s dead isn’t she?” 

Crichton looked Vrod in the eyes and nodded. He then went on to tell the account of Xhalax’s attempt to kill Aeryn, and her death at the hands of Crais on the planet Valdun.  
Vrod’s dark eyes returned to his drink. He fell silent for a long time, yet his face betrayed little. Crichton wondered how any man could learn of the death of his life’s love and not break down, but Vrod was cut from a different tree. He sat staring at his drink for a long time, his face granite.

“She was standing next to her prowler the first time I ever laid eyes on her.” Vrod said suddenly out of nowhere. He smiled. “She couldn’t have been more than 20 cycles old, and already she was the best pilot in the squadron. We all admired her. There wasn’t a male on the carrier who didn’t dream of recreating with her. She saw me staring at her one day and asked me what the frell I was staring at, and I just kept staring. She got mad and stormed off. Then a weeken or two later she saw me in the training forum and challenged me to a practice fight. We were pretty well matched I must say, but I somehow I managed to get her into a leg lock and she tapped out. By Cholak she was angry!” Vrod laughed and poured himself another glass of raslak before continuing. 

“Then I asked her if I could make it up to her by buying her a drink. So I did, and later that night we recreated. By the gods she was amazing! Best partner I ever had, and soon we started seeing each other beyond our allotted limits. We were breaking the rules but we didn’t care. Then… after a time… it turned into something else: we fell in love Crichton. We broke one of the most serious rules the Peacekeepers have. We became emotionally involved, and then, to make matters worse, we decided to conceive a child without the Ministry’s blessing. Xhalax intentionally went off her birth control regimen and she conceived. She told her superiors it was an accident and asked the surgeons to release the stasis immediately. Not long after Aeryn came screaming into this universe.” 

“Did you ever get to see her after she was born?” asked Crichton. 

“No. Peacekeeper babies are taken away immediately after birth. The parents have no contact with their children at all… for the rest of their lives,” Vrod replied with some regret. “But I would sometimes go down to the children’s ward, and from afar I would watch her in her classes. I never spoke to her. To do so would have ensured her an immediate death and myself a court-martial.” 

Crichton hissed and shook his head. “Well… that’s a frelled-up way to run an organization Vrod. I don’t care how the Peacekeepers justified that kind of policy, but it is frelled-up, fucked-up, and obscene any way you shake it. It is bad enough the Peacekeepers conquer and enslave entire worlds, but even more messed up is how they enslave each other…and somehow come to justify it!” Crichton slammed down his empty glass to accentuate his point. 

Vrod slowly smiled at him. For a moment Crichton worried he had pushed Vrod too far with his outburst, but the teacher took a moment to consider and then answered the human calmly. “Well…I’m not going to waste time elucidating Peacekeeper history to you Crichton. I agree that many of the Peacekeeper tenants seem cruel and oppressive to you, but what you must understand is that there were solid and justified reasons why some of these practices were put into place.”

“The Peacekeepers were not always completely warlike and militant, Vrod went on. “There was a time, millennia ago, when they were a force for good… when their creed was to protect and nurture societies that were weak and struggling. That all changed ten thousand cycles ago during the First Colonial War. Galactic alliances were suddenly split down the middle. Many worlds that had been under the protection of the Peacekeepers, for hundreds of cycles, suddenly turned coat and joined the Breakaway Colonies against the Peacekeepers. Peacekeeper families were split down the middle, with fathers fighting sons, brothers killing brothers, and daughters turning against their own mothers. This lawlessness nearly destroyed Peacekeeper society. Then afterwards, during the Great Division, the Peacekeeper population that was left adopted the practice of dispersing family bonds. Marriage was outlawed and those who opposed the new rules were cast out or executed. It was around this same time the Peacekeepers started to lose sight of their original mandate. If the worlds they had once tried to help were so ungrateful as to rise against them, then from that moment on they would manage them at the muzzle of a gun.” 

“Yeah I get the reasoning Vrod, but might doesn’t mean right.” John replied. “The Peacekeepers could not have been as altruistic as they thought themselves to be, if all those colonies and planets felt the need to revolt. I think you or Aeryn or most Peacekeepers don’t know a quarter of the truth of what went down all those centuries ago. Your people have been lied to and brainwashed so much over the millennia that you can no longer tell truth from fiction. And what is worse is you are all conditioned not to question what you have been told. I had a hell of a time getting Aeryn to question all the things she had been taught during her life. I just cannot believe she would willingly embrace those ideals again…and leave me as if all we had gone through together meant nothing to her.”  
John sat back in his seat and leaned his head back closing his eyes. Vrod studied him silently for some time. 

“You know Crichton, it was never your task to try to change Aeryn. If there was change, then it happened due to your influence, but you cannot assume it was your responsibility, and subsequent failure, just because she turned away from those changes and back to what she felt safe with. You take too much on yourself, and if I may say so, you expected too much from her. Peacekeepers are born and bred to serve, fight and die if need be. They live their lives in a truncated world ruled by discipline and duty. It is all they know. It is all she knew before she met you. Love, affection and family were as foreign to her as the Peacekeeper ways are to you. I find it rather amazing that the two of you managed to form the bond you did.” 

Crichton made no replay, so Vrod leaned in closer, clasping is hands in front of him. “Crichton…I tell you this, not as your teacher, but as a comrade: you must not hedge your future on Aeryn returning to you. She has made her decision, and once a Peacekeeper plots a course, he or she rarely strays from it.”  
John opened his eyes and looked at Vrod vacantly. “So I should give up hope?”

Vrod shook his head. “Not at all. Do not give up on the hope that you will find your way through the rest of your life. Do not give up hope that you may one day free yourself of all the shackles that bind you to the past and present. Do not give up hope that one day you will find peace and perhaps even happiness. But as far as Aeryn is concerned, there is no hope to be relinquished, because she took that hope with her. Only Aeryn can decide whether or not to return to you. It is out of your control. My advice? Let her go and move on.”  
Silence reigned for many microts after this, and both men fell into their own dark contemplations. Eventually Crichton stirred and spoke up: “You never finished your story Vrod. From what I understand, Xhalax and you were caught and arrested. Xhalax was given the choice to either kill you or kill Aeryn. She chose Aeryn. So why is it you are alive and talking to me now?”  
Vrod waved to the barmaid for more raslak. “When what we had done came to light, Xhalax and I were both arrested, imprisoned and brought before tribunal. They tortured us, but I refused to bear witness against her. At some point, however, they got to Xhalax… and threatened to kill Aeryn unless she testified against me. So she agreed to testify, knowing that I would gladly give my life for our daughter. I did not begrudge Xhalax this. She was under duress, and had to make an impossible choice. Yet I was more than willing to make the sacrifice so that our child could live. I was Peacekeeper. Death meant nothing to me. But then, the prosecuting officer told Xhalax she would have to do one more thing to ensure Aeryn’s survival: she would have to execute me herself.”  
The barmaid came poured more raslak into the men’s cups. Vrod took a long draught, wiped his mouth and resumed his tale.  
“I had a close comrade. He was a lieutenant commander in charge of ship security. His name was Koryn Llars. He and I had been lifelong comrades, and he just happened to also be the warden of the brig where I and Xhalax were being held. I had saved Koryn’s life, and his reputation, during a combat mission on an asteroid base several years prior to that, and since that time, Koryn bonded himself to me and swore to repay my kindness one day. It was he who had secretly kept me informed of the details of the court-martial proceedings against Xhalax. It was also he who came to me one day and told me that Xhalax had agreed to testify against me… and execute me… in exchange for our daughter’s life.” 

“So was Koryn the one who thought up a way to save you?” John interrupted. 

“He came up with the idea of providing a modified pulse pistol, re-calibrated to hit me with a less than lethal blast,” Vrod replied. “He also used his influence with his subordinates to make sure there was a physician present who would provide a false diagnoses of death. So on the day of my judgement the guards led me in to the courtroom. Xhalax and Koryn were both there, as well as all the command officers and the ship’s captain. The judge advocate read off the list of my crimes and then pronounced my sentence. He asked Xhalax if the accusations against me were true. Without hesitation she answered yes. I had to stifle a chuckle at how cold she sounded. For a moment I was actually wondering if she really ever loved me at all, but as she returned to her seat she shot me a look that told me everything. All her love and regret and pain were conveyed in that one look.”  
Vrod took another sip of his raslak, the memory of that day obviously affecting him deeply. 

“You see Crichton it was theater rather than an actual adjudication,” he continued. “They had to make an example of the two us. Well, anyway, after what seemed arns of worthless legal chatter, the judge advocate ordered Xhalax to step forward. Koryn followed her to where she stood in front of me at the center of the courtroom. He pulled out the pulse pistol and handed it to her. I knelt down and looked up at Xhalax. She was as white as frost, and I could see the torment behind her eyes. She only hesitated for a few microts… and then she fired.”

Across the saloon the crowd that had gathered around the gambling table let out a tremendous roar as the winner defeated his opponent. Vrod ignored the outburst and only stared down at his drink for some time before continuing. 

“I woke up some days later, inside a cargo crate,” he continued with a bit of a chuckle. “My head was pounding and every inch of my body ached. I pulled back my shirt to find a dark blue bruise spread across my chest. The blast from the rigged pistol was enough to make it look like I was dead, and to render me unconscious for days, but not enough to kill me. Yes… I was alive Crichton, and that was all that mattered. Aeryn would be safe and Xhalax would be spared execution. That is all I cared about. Well, somehow Koryn had managed to pass me off as dead and smuggle me off the carrier and into a transport ship. He left me with a small package of food cubes, a change of clothes and a bag of kryndars. A day later the crate was opened by a crewman who Koryn had hired to get me to my destination. Turns out he had sent me to a commerce asteroid just across the border inside the Uncharted Territories. Another three solar days later I boarded another ship and made my way over the next weekens here… to Tavis V. This was the farthest and most remote planet that I could afford to get to. I needed to get as far away from Peacekeeper territory as I could, and here I have remained and thrived.” 

John whistled his approval. “Wow. That is some tale. So you have been here ever since, making a living off pit fighting? Did you ever want to go back? Maybe find Aeryn and Xhalax?” 

“Many times, Crichton….many times,” Vrod replied ruefully. “But to do so would have only put Xhalax and Aeryn in even more jeopardy, as well as Koryn and those who abetted him. So I stayed away. I stayed here, and made a life for myself. But after hearing what you told me, had I known just how much my death had affected Xhalax, and how much the guilt from believing she had killed me had twisted her mind, I would have definitely gone back to try to find her and bring her what comfort I could.”

“Xhalax would have killed you Vrod… or at least tried to” Crichton said flatly. “She was willing to kill Aeryn. She was one seriously messed up female.”

Vrod gazed at Crichton with a hard cold stare. “I almost wish I had never met you hoo-man. All this news news of Aeryn’s exile, and of Xhalax’s death, has opened old, deep wounds that I had thought were healed. You are a curse Crichton.”

Crichton smiled. “Funny. You’re not the first person to call me a ‘curse’.” 

The two fell back into silence as the crowd in the saloon began to dissipate. As the line of sots stumbled out the door, the barmaid approached Vrod and Crichton and asked them politely to leave, as she swept the pile of empty glasses off the table. Crichton had been so engrossed with Vrod’s tale that he failed to realize how inebriated he was. Vrod was wobbly on his feet too, and as the two burly men meandered their way slowly to the exit, Vrod teetered to one side and was caught by his not-so-stable student. Throwing his teacher’s arm across his shoulders, Crichton grabbed the bigger man around the waist with his other arm guided Vrod out into the dark street. 

The early morning was chill and the air was dry. The twin moons of Tavis V were full and high and bright in the sky casting a pale blue pall across the city, and as the two men ambled their way back home. In their drunkenness, they did not notice a grey, lithe shadow hop down out of a window alcove and follow them silently and at a distance. 

****************************************************************************  
To Be Continued


End file.
